You got five minutes…by debgrant
Some of the best youth retreats happened when I was willing to build into the daily schedule 5 minutes for each of them to complain about whatever was crushing their world at the moment. The torrent of teenage angst gushed forth on a variety of topics related to hunger, sleep, rules, bathroom discomfort, and snarky remarks leveled at other group members’ annoying habits. (Habits were fair game - hurtful words at the person were not). My job during those 5 minutes was to bite my tongue. When I wasn’t deeply concerned about how much of my tongue would be left in my mouth, I often learned something.
Among the things I learned:
The youth rarely had an appreciation for my rapier wit and sarcastic retorts to their whining. Not their fault, their brains are not fully developed yet for nuances of my humor.
Complaints are real.
There is relief in letting the fart rip and danger in ignoring the turd that wants to be free.
I might be able to tweak a thing or two to make their lives in the moment better, but giving them 5 minutes in which I stopped complaining about them changed me.
We all have something to complain about. Daily.
Limiting the complaints frees up space for something good to move around.
We need to take turns.
We’ve got 5 minutes to give to each other.
If you ever need 5 minutes and no one’s around, here’s my email address: revdeb@jazzwater.com
Peace,
deb
Funny you should ask.
I live in Minnesota but am out in Colorado with my husband. This is my fifth trip since October. My wonderful brother-in-law died in November, and since then we, her son and her niece have been trying to help my sister make the transition to assisted living. It feels like a near impossibility. My sister has multiple major health problems, is on constant pain medication, demands constant care, and may be developing dementia. She is a diffult personality at the best of times, and this is not the best of times. In addition, my husband is now becoming responsible for overseeing her medical, financial and legal care--a massive undertaking in itself--and will be doing it at a distance in the first weeks after his own retirement..
The problem is that my sister is demanding to move back to her large house and get 24-hour care. Even with that care, assuming that it's dependable, it's not a do-able situation. She's already at the top level of care she can get at her residence. The next step is a skilled nursing facility. I don't think that she understands this yet. My brother-in-law took care of her every need for years, so that's what she's used to. My husband, God bless him, is planning to sit down with her one on one today and tell her that we, her four caregivers, are already maxed out. We can't do any more, and coming home is impossible. If she insists on coming home, she will have to do everything herself. We can't help her.
We are praying for patience and a resurgence of compassion. It's very hard to deal with her criticisms and snarky comments., which are often followed by ,"I was just joking!" and "You can do what you want." But the thing is, her pain is real, her anger is real, her grief over the loss of her husband, her home and her freedom is real. She's bored and depressed, and who wouldn't be?
So, I ask for prayers for us. Jesus didn't say, "Be compassionate to the easy people, the ones who are grateful for everything you do." He just said, "Love people." Period. No qualifications, no excuses. And he loves my sister, and died for love of her. Boy, do I need grace.
I bet I've gone over my five minutes. Thanks for listening.